The Legend of Zelda: The Occult of Greed and Power
by Washington Irving
Summary: After Ganondorf, Hyrule's people are desperate. Rebuilding, they ask, "Why us?" Preachers come, lead them, betray them.
1. Prologue

�� In retrospect, a wise observer would have been able to make the connections. We should have seen it---but there were grains of sand, weathered from the rocks of prejudice, self-confidence, pride, and greed which scratched our eyes and blinded us. That was eight years ago. We hope we have become wiser.

�� It was eight years ago that Ganondorf came to power in the Gerudo Desert. The first male born to the nearly all-female Gerudo race in a century, he was by default made their king. Relations between the Gerudos and the noble and ancient Hylian race, blessed by the godesses, had always been tense, but as the Gerudo are one of Hyrule's four major powers, the newly-crowned king was invited to Hyrule castle as part of a welcoming ceremony.

�� Our king---and many of us, in fact---took to Ganondorf too well for my comfort. The Gerudo are not to be trusted, it is said, and even though Ganondorf swore allegiance to King Daphnes, I never let myself believe anything he said fully. But his smooth and slippery words, his promises of trust, his ideas for the kingdom's future, appealed to the king's desire for his kingdom's security.

�� As it turns out, intelligence reports were already coming in that Ganondorf's past---which had been almost entirely a mystery---was disturbing. There were rumors---vague and conflicting, but pervasive among the Gerudos nonetheless---that Ganondorf had been born of two heretical witches. Our spies learned that as a child, Ganondorf had been charismatic and popular, but also intelligent, and that he had been obsessed with the Gerudo nation's inferior status as compared to that of the greater power vested in Hyrule Castle. It is said that after he came of age---for he could not take the kingship immediately at that time, while the former Gerudo king was still reigning---he had vanished, and his whearabouts during that time were unknown to anyone.

�� It was also around the time of Ganondorf's coronation that domestic troubles began to arise among the two remaining Hylian nations---those of Death Mountain, the Goron nation, and of Zora's Domain, the Zora nation. The Gorons experienced a sudden infestation of monsters---most conspicuously Dodongos, the fire-breathing dinosaur-like creatures that are so rare in Hyrule---in its main quarry, the Dodongo's Cavern, which was subsequently sealed off by an enormous rock. (This was devastating to the Gorons, to whom rocks are food.) At the same time, the young Zora Princess Ruto vanished without a trace, causing the Zoras began scouring the waters of Hyrule---the river, which they take pride in calling Zora's River, and Lake Hylia---and their deity, the enormous fish Jabu-Jabu, became sick. Additionally, the wild province of the Kokiri Forest was reported to have become more dangerous, and our kingdom's sages reported some sort of deep disturbance coming from it. (I have never quite understood the Kokiri Forest. It is said that one of Hyrule's ancient warrior-kings made a pact with some dominant power that slumbers deep within it, watching over the fabled, eternally-youthful Kokiri. This is nothing more that a rumor, a legend, a fairy-tale, but I have heard hints that there is some truth to it. The precise knowledge is passed through the Hylian royal family and shared with the upper echelons of the Hylian royalty, as well as some royal affiliates, such as diplomats and high mages, but I am not privy to it.)

�� I later learned that Ganondorf was behind all this trouble. With secret, ancient black magicks, he caused monsters to appear and blocked the Dodongo's Cavern with the enormous boulder, and he caused Jabu-Jabu's sickness, which resulted in the Zora princess becoming stuck inside the creature. It also seems that he in some way caused the disturbance and the Kokiri Forest. Ganondorf, it seems, was motivated by a desire to obtain the Spiritual Stones, three sacred relics held by the Goron and Zora royal families and by something inside the Kokiri Forest: he told the leader of the Gorons that he would solve their problems if they handed over their treasure, the Goron's Ruby. From what I understand, those three relics are necessary to open the door to the Sacred Realm, which is the resting place of the Triforce---the fabled power of the goddesses. Many Hylians consider these stories nonsense, but royal records show that there have been prolonged and bloody wars over the goddesses' relic in the past, which suggest its veracity.

�� At any rate, it seems that some people within the royal hierarchy knew of the blatantly treasonous acts being perpetrated by Ganondorf, but did not come out, because they never thought that anything would come of it. It was this silence that allowed what happened to happen.

�� The nations of Hyrule refused to submit to Ganondorf. I do not know how long they could have held out if no one had intervened, but as fate would have it, someone did. A young Hylian by the name of Link met Zelda, the young princess of Hyrule. (How exactly he did, I'm unsure. The princess's chamber is always heavily guarded, and no mere civilians are allowed in. Nonetheless, he somehow met her.) Zelda, who I remember never trusted Ganondorf any more than me, told Link what she suspected was Ganondorf's plan, and convinced him that the best way to thwart him would be taking the Triforce for themselves. Thus, Link, acting as Hyrule's royal messenger, visited the three nations and, using little more than a dagger and a shield, undid the damage that Ganondorf had done. In gratitude, the leaders of the nations granted him the Sacred Stones.

�� However, around this time, Ganondorf struck. He led an assault on Hyrule Castle, with Princess Zelda as his target. Princess Zelda was spirited away by her nanny, but Ganondorf was not captured or indicted. During the assault, he and his soldiers---Gerudo women---had all been cloaked and hooded, so that their identities were unknown. Indeed, Ganondorf visited the castle in plain sight not long afterwards and gave his condolences to the king.

�� The boy, Link, with the three Sacred Stones in his posession, made his way to the Temple of Time, situated in a quiet part of Hyrule Castle Town. Through a process that remains a mystery to me, he opened the Door of Time, which had for long served as the back wall of the Temple. Beyond it, there is an expansive circular chamber, flooded with light from windows that cannot be seen to exist when the temple is viewed from the outside. In the center is the Pedestal of Time, and thrust into it is the Master Sword, the ancient, holy sword which seems to have had no beginning, as its earliest references in our records simply call it the "Master Sword," with no explanation for its existence or creation.

�� What happened next is uncertain. Our intelligence postulates that just as Link was about to access the Sacred Realm, Ganondorf appeard and overpowered him, took the Sacred Stones by force, and, with his extensive knowledge of arcane magicks, opened the door to the Sacred Realm. But whatever happened, Link vanished, and Ganondorf laid hands upon the Triforce.

�� With one touch, Ganondorf had control over the fabric of Hyrule's existence. He wasted no time.

�� In a grand display, Ganondorf marched to Hyrule castle alone. Still recuperating from the loss of Princess Zelda and crippled by the previous attack, no one was expecting Ganondorf to, with a wave of his hand, kill the guards at the door. But once he had, the suspicions of many of us were confirmed. The guards led a courageous battle, but they were, in the end, no match for Ganondorf's power. I was there---I remember. Some he eliminated with what looked like orbs of nothingness. Others fell victim to beams of light. Still others were suffocated by a mysterious pestilence that he spread throughout the castle, a pestilence that ate away at flesh and stone. It was horrible to behold. I barely escaped through a hole in the wall created during the fighting. I jumped into the river and swam away as quickly as I could, not caring where I went.

�� From what I understand, the king was not there when he entered the throne room. The king had gone into hiding, but precisely where he was is a secret that I shall never know.

�� After he took Hyrule Castle, Ganondorf extended his influence. That day, the sky grew dark---unnaturally dark. Clouds appeared, but it was not clouds that caused the darkness. I've heard terrible things from the survivors---that there were sounds of snarling beasts everywhere, that they felt their minds falling into madness, that wherever they looked, there seemed to be a pair of yellow eyes smiling malevolently at them.

�� From that point on, Hyrule became a scarred wasteland of death and horror. The Castle Town was especially hard hit---the area around it was always dark, and inside, I have heard that the bodies of the dead walked, waiting to recruit more to their ranks. Hyrule Castle was destroyed, or reformed, or something---and the black, spire-topped monstrosity that was called Ganon's Castle took its place, floating over a sea of magma. Death Mountain's ring of smoke became a ring of flame, and dangerous eruptions became frequent. Zora's Domain froze over entirely trapping the Zoras in the ice. The lack of water caused Lake Hylia to shrink drastically. Hyrule Field became inhabited by terrifying ghosts. And we all lived in Ganondorf's shadow, knowing that we were powerless to resist him.

�� I waited in small-time Kakariko village for seven years. I expected to spend the rest of my life that way.

�� But suddenly, Link reappeared. Seven years older now, he wielded the Master Sword and carried a proper Hylian shield. He confronted Ganondorf's power---not directly, but in the temples of the peoples of Hyrule (which, besides the races I have already mentioned, include the legendary and extinct Sheikah). He purged the temples of the evil that had corrupted them, clearing the land of the stench of Ganondorf's control and freeing the races.

�� And as Link built up his strength and beat back Ganondorf in this manner, the rest of us became hopeful. Indeed, we began to feel that we could aid Link. And the day came when he said we could. He said that he was going to confront Ganondorf one-on-one, but that while such a move was Hyrule's only hope, it would result in an enormous backlash. He said that Ganondorf's armies would come out to kill us as soon as Ganondorf knew that he was under attack. So he told us to arm ourselves, because we were going to confront Ganondorf's darkness.

�� The battle was at night. We saw hordes of monsters---skeletons, mummies, floating skulls, Dodongos---march up to Kakariko both from Hyrule Field and from the path to Death Mountain. And armed, we fought them.

�� Meanwhile, Link was fighting Ganondorf in his castle. I do not know the precise details of the battle, but I've learned that Princess Zelda was somehow involved. And I know that in the end, Ganondorf's castle was destroyed, but rumors say that Ganondorf's hate-filled, evil heart, through the power of the Triforce, transmuted his body into a shape that reflected his heart, that of some dark, evil beast, which Link had to slay himself.

�� No matter how it happened, we all felt it when Ganondorf finally fell---the land almost became visibly brighter, and a shadow was lifted from our hearts. The enemies that were attacking the kingdoms of Hyrule retreated and fled, and those of us who had been hiding, noticing that the assault, that the noise and the crashes had stopped, peered out from our houses.

�� This was a year after Link had emerged from hiding.

�� Since then, the kingdom has been rebuilding. Link has vanished once again, with the word from the princess being that he is never to return. King Daphnes is trying his hardest to regain control of the kingdom, but the public sees him as something of a bumbler, since he allowed Ganondorf to take over the kingdom. Much of the public confidence is vested in Princess Zelda herself, because the public knows that she distrusted Ganondorf from the beginning and suspects that she had a hand in his final demise. I myself am sticking by the king, because I always have, and because it is tradition that he should rule, not the princess. Nonetheless, I wish for no disputes to arise between the king and his daughter in this war-torn country. We're all barely holding together, and the Castle Town has just been rebuilt. The country is in a fragile state, and I will do my best to hold it together.

�� This testament is to the Royal Archives.

Signed: The Royal Advisor, Tarquinus


	2. Chapter I

Chapter I

My lamp's light sharply contrasted with the darkest night, leaving me stranded on an island of light beyond which I could see nothing.

Thunder rumbled overhead. I pulled my cloak up and over my head, anticipating a downpour. I knew rain was coming, for even though tonight was the night of the full moon, nothing shone through the clouds. All I could see was the grass beneath me, slightly yellowed and stiff. Every now and then I came across a patch of dirt--ocasionally, it turned out to be one of the paths that cross and criscross the field.

I probably should have followed the paths. I was completely lost.

When I look back on it, I think to myself, "Why did I get lost?" Truth be told, I have a penchant for being lost. I like new places, and I'm lucky enough to always end up somewhere new when I get lost. So I often lose myself of my own accord, wandering aimlessly until I come across something interesting. But that night, I felt a sense of foreboding. My senses told me I ought to stay somewhere familiar and safe for the night, and I know better than to disregard my senses. Looking back, I don't think I'll ever know why I took the unknown path I took that night.

It began with a "Goddamnit!" from behind the brush. I stopped in my tracks--I hadn't noticed anyone nearby. I swung my lamp around, illuminating the bushes in the circle of light. Whoever was back there didn't notice; he continued in his line of expletives: "This horse is too much fucking trouble . . . hold still! You're gonna run off, and then where will you fucking be? In the middle of fucking nowhere, that's where. And I'll be in a fucking bit of trouble myself, so we'll both be worse off, so I don't understand why you won't just fucking hold still!"

A loud whinny came from behind the brush, and I saw a pair of hooves and a horse's long head appear--the horse appeared to be rearing up--and then disappear. There was a dull thud, and a loud "Ah! Fuck!" And with that, the horse, I saw, was free, as it leapt out from behind the brush.

"Get him! You, with the lamp! Get him!"

The man was shouting at me, I decided, and I lunged for the reins. The horse was already past me, but I still grabbed what rope I could and held on tight. The horse wasn't quite moving at breakneck speed, but it still dragged me along the ground, its hooves pounding down inches away from my feet. Luckily, my weight and the friction with the ground told it to slow down until it finally came to a stop.

I led the horse back what distance it had dragged me to find a man in front of the brushes tending to what looked like a badly-bruised arm.

". . . just lucky the little dick didn't get my head," the man grumbled.

"That might be broken," I said to him.

"Yeah? No shit, kid," the man said. He was dirty, rough-shaven, and dressed poorly--his appearance was altogether unpresentable. "But I don't happen to have the stuff to make a splint; do you?"

"No . . ."

"Ah, shit," he said--in response to something about his arm, not paying attention to me. "Listen, kid, you've gotta take this horse back with me. I can't do it by myself now. If he gets away I'll never get him back. There'll be some Rupees in it for you . . ."

"Where are we taking the horse to?"

"Back to Lon Lon Ranch. It's about a half-an-hour walk. Terrain's not too hard, and you can stay there for the night. Where exactly, I dunno, but if you're interested in pretty girls--"

"It sounds good to me--wait. Is it dangerous at all?"

"You mean, like, bandits and such?"

"Bandits, ghosts . . ."

"Ghosts?" The man laughed hoarsely. "Fuck, kid, we haven't had ghosts since the war, you should know that. Get walking, kid."

I walked slowly, with one hand holding the black horse's reins and the other stretching the lamp out in front of me. The uncouth man walked behind me, grimacing as he swung his arms, holding his right with his left. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw him take a deep swig from a bottle of milk.

"Yeah," he said, "the ghosts came out because of all the bad feelings in the war. They were everywhere the night that it started." He stopped, and I heard a gulping noise. "They appeared out of nowhere, and there were all sorts of them . . . there were thin, bony ones, like starving children, and there were things that looked like shadows in midair, and there were horrible, bloody ones, some rotting, some missing limbs . . . there were some that were just lines of blurry black and blue dust . . . there were some that you couldn't see at all, but you could hear screeches from, or smell the burnt flesh of, or feel like a freezing wind that pierced your body--your soul."

He spoke with a gravity and seriousness that had been absent from his speech before. I found myself, despite my better knowledge, wishing that the moon were out, fearing the absolute darkness that had engulfed the world.

"You saw that many? Where were you?"

"Me? I was at the ranch, kid. I'm always at the ranch."

"Tonight?"

"Tonight this horse ran off. Talon said it was 'cause I'd tied it up wrong, but I know it was because he hasn't bought new ropes for a long time, and they're wearing thin. The horse managed to break 'em tonight."

"But . . . if you were at the ranch . . . this is really far away from the castle town, where it all started. Why were there so many ghosts there?"

"The massacre and the fear, the hatred . . . it was all all a lot more than we've had in a long time. Hyrule itself was quivering, and the ghosts were proof of that. But now . . . none. And the silence is almost more frightening than the ghosts."

"It's because the war sapped Hyrule's strength and made the land barren."

"That's not it, kid."

I didn't respond for a moment. "What?"

"Maybe it's part of it, but it's not most of it. It's the relief, kid. Everyone's happy, because life can start over again."

"That's good, isn't it? Why would it be a frightening silence?"

"Because it's a sham. It's only happiness on the surface. But just below it lurks hysteria, waiting to break at any moment. Because things aren't really as good as they seem. They're worse than things were just before the war, really, because so many people will be hurt by what the war has left behind. Yeah, this quiet will become something even worse than ghosts."

"Does it have to?"

"Who's gonna stop it? You? You can try if you want, kid, but it'll be like trying to stop a torrent from pouring."

As if to remind me of the futility of that, thunder rumbled overhead once again.

From then on, we walked in silence. The land was open, with the occasional tree here and there. There were no signs of movement as we walked--up; the land had a slight tilt.

After a long while, we passed a large, painted wooden sign. It featured cows' heads and the words "Lon Lon Ranch: Home of Hyrule's Finest Milk!"

"How much competition do you guys have, exactly?" I asked.

The man scratched his neck. "Don't mind the sign . . . there are a couple of ranches scattered here and there throughout Hyrule, but they're really all local--they provide milk for the taverns in small towns. We're the only substantial one. We provide for virtually all of the milk in the Castle Town--not to mention, our finest milk goes to the castle itself."

"Do you mean King Daphnes--?"

"Drinks from the fruit of the udders of our very own cows, stolen from their young for his enjoyment."

"You . . . resent King Daphnes?"

"Somewhat. He allowed Ganondorf to come in and take over the kingdom, and yet he's still on his throne, where he lords it over us with less. He deserves no more than I--I could run the kingdom better than him."

"Could you have stopped Ganondorf?"

"I--I . . . I don't think so, actually," he said in a small voice. "You see, while Ganondorf was ruling the country, he--"

"Ingo!" a big, booming voice shouted. There was a light up ahead. "Got the horse, do you?"

"Yeah, Talon, I got it."

"Good. But what's--Ingo, who's that?"

"This is . . . I don't know."

"My name is Usko," I said, hailing the man Talon. "I was walking the field, and I chanced by your man having trouble with the horse. The horse managed to get away, so I quickly grabbed it by the reins and subdued it. After that--"

"He helped me bring it back," Ingo said. "The horse hit me in the arm, see." He held out his upper right arm, which was nasty-looking--black and blue already.

"Ooh, Ingo, that's bad."

"Damn right it is! And my milk's all out, too."

"We'll get to that in a second. What did you promise . . . Usko?"

"Money and a night's stay."

"Oh, well, that's all right, then. Kid," he said, turning to me, "how much do you want for this?"

"Well, sir, I dunno if it would be fair of me to ask for money . . . your man couldn't well avoid being hit, and I couldn't just leave him there--"

"Oh, good, then!" he cut me off briskly. "And the night's stay?"

"I wouldn't mind that, sir. It has been a long walk, and I've really got nowhere else."

"Well, all right then, ah--" he stopped. By now we were within good visibility, and I could tell that Talon, while unkempt like Ingo, was--well, large, unlike Ingo. His eyes narrowed, looking at me suspiciously. "Nowhere to go, eh? I'm not harboring a criminal, boy."

"No, sir, I'm not!"

"What are you, then? A good-for-nothin'?"

"I'm--"

Thunder rolled overhead while Talon waited for an answer.

"It's hard to explain, sir. I come from a family that doesn't live here anymore."

"Here? You mean in Hyrule?"

"Yes, sir. They passed beyond the mountains not long after I was born."

"And left you here?"

I looked down. "It was . . ."

Fear. Fire. Darkness. Hate.

"Yes," I finally said.

"Sounds like bad stock," he said. "I don't know about--"

"For God's sake, Father!" came a voice. I looked around and saw, near us, a wooden house with a light shining out of an upper window. The voice that had rung out of the darkness had come from there. It was a smooth alto with a deep, melodic quality.

"Malon, you get yourself to bed!"

"Father, just let him in! He helped Ingo bring the horse back!"

There was a short silence. Then: "Have you been out since I last saw you?"

"I had to come out! When I saw Ingo and the boy coming back with the horse, I wondered what was going on! So I went and asked Ingo, and he said he'd gotten away! Now, because you refused to buy new ropes, the horse is spooked, and Ingo's probably got a broken arm! The least you can do is let the boy gave a room!"

I saw Talon's face fall in guilt. And yet, he was still considering whether to let me in or not.

"Come on, boy," came the voice again. "You're sleeping here whether my father OK's it or not."

I paused myself for a moment. Long ago, my wise father had warned me to beware women above all things. I remembered the first thing that he had ever said to me on the subject: "Boy, our kind never lusts for power. In all our dark history, we have never tried to be more than we are. Nor have we lusted for money. Nor have we shown a passion simply for violence, or any other strange tendencies that overtake men when they are crowded together in small cities. No, but we have a weakness which cannot be removed from any race: we are weak for women. And women have the strangest ways of making themselves look safe and innocent. You never see the danger coming from them. The safest thing to do is to stay around women who have partners. You'll be smart enough not to get yourself in any scuffles. Don't get yourself around single women, because you can't trust yourself to not get tangled up with the wrong sort."

I've since learned that this kind of advice is useless. Perhaps my father gave it to me as a sort of temporary protection, hoping that I would obey it just long enough, until a time when I could excercise good judgement and fend for myself.

I thought to myself that I had no choice, anyway. I needed a place to sleep, no matter what my father had ever said.

So I went to meet the woman. 


End file.
